Selections from the Table Talk of Martin Luther

Our Lord God electeth from hearts, to whom he revealeth his Word, and therewithal he giveth them mouths to speak it; preserveth and maintaineth it, not by sword, but through his Divine Power.

God will keep his Word through the writing-pen upon earth; the Divines are the heads or quills of the pens, but the Lawyers are the stumps.

The second Psalm is one of the best Psalms. I love that Psalm with my heart. It strikes and slashes valiantly amongst the Kings, Princes, Counsellors, Judges, etc.

Let the adversaries rage and swell their fills, and as long as they can. God hath set the sea her bounds; he suffers the same to beat and rage with her waves, as if they would over-run, cover, and drown everything; yet,…

Tyrants, sectaries, seducers, and heretics do nothing else but drive us into the Bible, to make us read more diligently therein, and with more fervency to sharpen our prayers.

I did not learn my divinity at one only time, but I was constrained to search deeper and deeper, to which my temptations brought me; for no man, without trials and temptations, can attain to the true understanding of the…

I esteem those to be the best Preachers which teach the common people and youth most plainly and simply, without subtlety, screwed words, or enlargements.

God himself preacheth, threateneth, reproveth, affrighteth, comforteth, absolveth, administereth the sacraments, etc.

I am sure and certain, when I go up to the pulpit, or to the cathedral, to preach or read, that it is not my word which I speak, but my tongue is the pen of a ready writer, as the Psalmist saith.

A true Christian must hold for certain, and must say, That Word which is delivered and preached to the wicked, to the dissemblers, and to the ungodly, is even as well God's Word as that which is preached to the good and…

Believe in Christ; do what thou oughtest to do in thy vocation. This is the only practice in Divinity.

Let us not lose the Bible, but with all diligence and in God's fear read and preach the same; for if that remaineth, flourisheth, and be taught, then all is safe.

We ought not to measure, censure, and understand the Scriptures according to our own natural sense and reason, but we ought diligently by prayer to meditate therein, and to search after the same.

The chief lesson and study in Divinity is well and rightly to learn to know Christ, for he is therein very friendly and familiarly pictured unto us.

To be short, the Holy Scripture is the best and highest book of God, full of comfort in all manner of trials and temptations; for it teacheth of Faith, Hope, and Love far otherwise than by human reason and understanding…